On Fri, Jul 08, 2011 at 10:49:39AM -0600, peggy miller wrote: > Hi -- reacting to quantum mechanics discussion. > Question -- I probably need to go back and reread my quantum and complexity > books, but asking anyway -- I can accept quantum particles gain a state when > being measured, but that only shows the influence of observation on quantum > particles. How do we prove that they have "no state" when not being > observed? Maybe they are observed by something else, or reacting to other > influences causing an existence and behavior that we simply call "no state". > >
Your terminology of "state" here is confusing and non-standard. All quantum particles have state, which is a vector in a Hilbert space (eg a wavefunction). When a measurement is performed, afterwards the particle's state is aligned with one of the eigenvectors of the measurement operator, which corresponds to a particular classical outcome. -- ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Prof Russell Standish Phone 0425 253119 (mobile) Principal, High Performance Coders Visiting Professor of Mathematics [email protected] University of New South Wales http://www.hpcoders.com.au ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
